A 20-year-old climber from Pakistan on Thursday became the youngest to climb Mount Kanchenjunga as the world’s third highest peak recorded season’s first summit with successful ascent from several climbers.
Shehroze Kashif reached the summit with 26 other climbers on Thursday noon, shortly after the ropes were laid to Kanchenjungha (8,586 m) summit. Twenty climbers from Pioneer Adventure and six from Seven Summit Treks reached the summit as of Thursday noon, according to Dawa Sherpa of Seven Summit Treks and Nivesh Karki of Pioneer Adventures.
Several other climbers are expected to summit the peak over the next few days.
Kashif secured the world record for the youngest person to summit K2 last year (at 18 years old). Known as savage mountain, K2– the second tallest peak after Everest—is considered as one of the most difficult eight-thousander peaks to climb. He climbed Everest in the same year. He had previously climbed the Broad Peak, 12th highest mountain in the world, at the age of 17, a feat which earned him the nickname ‘The Broad Boy’.
Kashif wants to set a record to climb the top five 8,000 meter peaks on the planet, becoming the youngest person to do so. Shehroze will attempt Lhotse and Makalu, the fourth and fifth highest mountains this season.
Another Pakistani climber Sirbaz Khan, who is with Mingma Gyalje Sherpa’s team, is also on his way to the summit. He is on a mission to become the first climber of his country to summit 14 peaks above 8,000 meter. Kanchenjunga is his 10th 8,000er.
Nepali female climber Purnima Shrestha was also one among climbers successfully summiting Kanchenjunga. She had left for Kanchenjunga with a target of climbing three mountains in a single spring window.
Born and raised in Gorkha, a remote part of Nepal, photojournalist Shrestha came into mountaineering for the thrill of adventure. In 2017, Purnima had scaled Mount Manaslu. Next year, she made it to Everest summit without any formal climbing training or proper acclimatization.
Then, a year later in 2019, she reached the top of Ama Dablam. In 2021, she successfully scaled Mount Annapurna and Mount Dhaulagiri becoming a member of the first Nepali female expedition team to reach the summit of these two mountains.
This has inspired her to tell more mountain stories, mainly fast melting glaciers considered as the source of water for Asia.
Other notable Nepali summiteers include Pasang Lhamu Sherpa Akita who is Nepal’s first female mountaineering instructor. Akita has already climbed Everest, K2 and Dhaulagiri, and wants to climb all 14 peaks above 8000 meters.
Climbing guide Sanu Sherpa is the third Nepali mountaineer to complete all 14 mountains above 8,000 meters. According to Karki, Sanu is just short of two peaks — Makalu and G2 which he plans to climb this year— to become the world’s first person to scale all 14 8000ers twice.
On April 27, Imagine Nepal had made an attempt to summit the peak. However, a heavy snowfall forced the team to retreat. According to Mingma Gyalje Sherpa, team leader of the outfitter, they lost the route above 8,300 meter, as they followed an old rope.
The Nepal government has issued 68 climbing permits for Kanchenjunga, the second highest number of climbing permits for the season. A total of 316 climbing permits have been issued for Everest this year, almost 100 less than last year.
